PERLEPOC(1)      Perl Programmers Reference Guide     PERLEPOC(1)



NAME
       README.epoc - Perl for EPOC

SYNOPSIS
       Perl 5 README file for the EPOC Release 5 operating sys-
       tem.

INTRODUCTION
       EPOC is an OS for palmtops and mobile phones. For more
       informations look at: http://www.symbian.com/

       This is a port of perl to the epocemx SDK by Eberhard Mat-
       tes, which itself uses the SDK by symbian. Essentially
       epocemx it is a POSIX look alike environment for the EPOC
       OS.  For more information look at: http://epocemx.source-
       forge.net/

       perl and epocemx runs on Epoc Release 5 machines: Psion
       5mx, 5mx Pro, Psion Revo, Psion Netbook and on the Erics-
       son M128. It may run on Epoc Release 3 Hardware (Series 5
       classic), too. For more information about this hardware
       please refer to http://www.psion.com/

       Vendors which like to have support for their devices are
       free to send me a sample.

INSTALLING PERL ON EPOC
       You can download a ready-to-install version from
       http://www.oflebbe.de/oflebbe/perl/

       You will need at least ~6MB free space in order to install
       and run perl.

       Please install the emxusr.sis package from
       http://epocemx.sourceforge.net/ first.

       Install perl.sis on the EPOC machine. If you do not know
       how to do that, consult your PsiWin documentation.

       Perl itself and its standard library is using 4 MB disk
       space.  Unicode support and some other modules are left
       out. (For details, please look into epoc/createpkg.pl). If
       you like to use these modules, you are free to copy them
       from a current perl release.

STARTING PERL ON EPOC
       Please use the epocemx shell to start perl. perl inte-
       grates with the conventions of epocemx.

       Editors on Epoc

       A suitable text editor can be downloaded from symbian
       http://www.symbian.com/developer/downloads/files/edi-
       tor.zip

       Features of Perl on Epoc

       The built-in function EPOC::getcwd returns the current
       directory.




       Restrictions of Perl on Epoc

       Features are left out, because of restrictions of the
       POSIX support in EPOC:

       o   socket IO is only implemented poorly. You can only use
           sysread and syswrite on them. The commands read,
           write, print, <> do not work for sockets. This may
           change iff epocemx supports sockets.

       o   kill, alarm and signals. Do not try to use them. This
           may be impossible to implement on EPOC.

       o   select is missing.

       o   binmode does not exist. (No CR LF to LF translation
           for text files)

       o   EPOC does not handle the notion of current drive and
           current directory very well (i.e. not at all, but it
           tries hard to emulate one). See PATH.

       o   Heap is limited to 4MB.

       o   Dynamic loading is not implemented.

       Compiling Perl 5 on the EPOC cross compiling environment

       Sorry, this is far too short.

       o   You will need the epocemx SDK from Eberhard Mattes.

       o   Get the Perl sources from your nearest CPAN site.

       o   Unpack the sources.

       o   Build a native perl from this sources... Make sure to
           save the miniperl executable as miniperl.native.

           Start again from scratch

                 cp epoc/* .
                 ./Configure -S
                 make
                 cp miniperl.native miniperl
                 touch miniperl.exe
                 make
                 perl createpkg.pl

                 emxsis perl.pkg perl.sis

SUPPORT STATUS OF PERL ON EPOC
       I'm offering this port "as is". You can ask me questions,
       but I can't guarantee I'll be able to answer them. Since
       the port to epocemx is quite new, please check the web for
       updates first.

       Very special thanks to Eberhard Mattes for epocemx.

AUTHOR
       Olaf Flebbe 
       http://www.oflebbe.de/oflebbe/perl/

LAST UPDATE
       2003-01-18